Lives in Cricket No 52 - Schooled in Cricket (2nd edition)

8 Lincolnshire away to Yorkshire Second XI were at other venues in Yorkshire. It was a name I had always known in connection with some nets near Rothwell – which I’d got to visit once in 1980. And if at no other time I must have seen him bowl in an annual friendly fixture which I shall describe later. There are – I have now distinguished – several reasons why Johnny Lawrence’s life is so fascinating for me. One is a fact as it was told to me before I started my project – and which I was easily able to verify in terms of his own career – that Johnny was almost certainly the only man to have turned down opportunities to play for both Yorkshire – his beloved home and native county – and the chance to play for England. It was Johnny’s youngest son and cricket coaching successor, Stephen, who told me of this particular claim to fame. By this time I was having coaching from Stephen and every so often he would throw in some titbit – “my dad used to say”; “my dad told the story about Wally Hammond…”, “I heard that my dad once attempted to hook a ferociously fast delivery from Freddie Trueman and the ball tore into his thumb – through his batting glove – and caused excruciating pain – and then proceeded to fly over the boundary for six …” The latter is a story I have as yet been unable to verify but sixes do come off batting gloves. I saw Brian Close benefit in this way in a match at Scarborough and am told it wasn’t such an uncommon event when the bowling was downhill and often downwind from the River End at Johnny’s main home ground at Taunton during his first-class career. I was also fascinated – as it unfolded in my researches – with the way in which age never seemed to be a barrier to performance and how he seemed to break more age barriers than could be expected of any person in one lifetime. Next, here was someone with determinedly strong views and principles whom – the more I learned – I couldn’t help Preamble